FEATURE: MOULIN ROUGE Interviews with Nicole Kidman and Baz Luhrmann, the stylishly edgy director who turned William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet into a surprise box-office hit.

• Halle Berry Goes Topless For $500,000
• David Lynch turns failed TV pilot into new movie David Lynch's new movie was adapted from a failed TV pilot show.
• Bridget Still On Top In UK After Five Weeks
• Depardieu To Try Out His English Again
• Marilyn Manson Makes Music From Hell For Depp
• Premiere Kino Holding
• Novem Productions
• Menemsha Entertainment
• Michael Haneke
• Paradiso
• Mikado
• Catch 23 Entertainment
• Legendary cowboy drama Bonanza is getting the Star Wars treatment as TV bosses announced plans to make a prequel to the series.
• World Wide Motion Pictures Corp. -WWMP- Launches East Coast Opening of `'AMY''
• 'Shrek' Animators Add to Reality
• Some Coming Movies For Which The Pentagon Provided Assistance:

Halle Berry Goes Topless For $500,000

The International Press report today that Halle Berry is being paid an extra $500,000 to show her breasts in her new film, Swordfish, in which she stars with John Travolta. The 33-year-old American actress, who came to acting after a successful modeling career and shot to fame in The Flintstones film seven years ago, initially refused to strip for the film until the producers offered the extra fee on top of her $2.4 million pay check. TO TOP

David Lynch turns failed TV pilot into new movie David Lynch's new movie was adapted from a failed TV pilot show.

Mulholland Drive features a bizarre cast of characters, including a shadowy beast behind a doughnut shop, a babbling clairvoyant, a menacing cowboy, a gigolo pool cleaner and a midget in a wheelchair.

The Twin Peaks director has been at the Cannes Film Festival to promote the movie. It stars Naomi Watts and Laura Elena Harring. British-born Watts plays a star-struck woman who heads to Hollywood hoping to become a movie star.

In the official Cannes program guide, Mulholland Drive's description is simply: "Love story in the city of dreams".

Lynch said: "My choice. I wrote that line. Because that's what it's about to me. And also, there's no paragraph or 17 pages or whatever that would say what the film says, because it's words. So it's a little bit absurd to try to say with a short group of words what two years of work in film is about." TO TOP

Bridget Still On Top In UK After Five Weeks

After five weeks on release, Bridget Jones's Diary remains at the top of the UK box office, having taken a further $1.85m over the weekend, bringing its gross in total to $45m. It now looks set to overtake Notting Hill as the most successful British film ever. Meanwhile, the critically panned Captain Corelli's Mandolin has held on to the number two slot, taking a further $1.2m. Of the other new entries this week, only The Dish, starring Sam Neil, managed to make it into the top 10, debuting in the number five position. TO TOP

Depardieu To Try Out His English Again

Gerard Depardieu and his partner Carole Bouquet are in talks to co-star in an English language film King of the Storks. According to a source close to EIOL, the project has been described as a fable-like romantic drama set in Spain, Rome and Eastern Europe. Written by veteran Italian screenwriter Ennio De Concini, who wrote the 1961 classic, Divorce, Italian Style, the film will mark the feature debut of Italian director Livia Lancellotti. TO TOP

Marilyn Manson Makes Music From Hell For Depp

Controversial Goth rocker Marilyn Manson has been approached to score the forthcoming Johnny Depp movie From Hell and recently visited the star on the set in London to discuss the project. The movie, directed by Albert and Allen Hughes, is based on the story of Jack the Ripper, with Depp playing the part of police inspector Frederick Abberline. The film's backers 20th Century Fox have described the film as: "An intense urban spin on the horrific legend of Jack the Ripper that unravels a chilling alleged conspiracy involving the highest powers in England." A British spokesperson for Manson confirmed Depp's approach and said it was likely the rocker would be involved with the music for the film in "some capacity." TO TOP

Premiere Kino Holding

Russian group Premiere Kino Holding has secured a clutch of A-grade all rights deals which bolster the company’s position as a powerhouse distributor and underline the country’s recovering potential as a film market.

Through its sister company Era Media, which has all Eastern European rights, Premiere Kino is finalizing the acquisition of the Franchise Pictures slate which includes titles such as Sean Penn’s Cannes competition film The Pledge and Renny Harlin’s Driven. Premiere which has rights throughout Russia and the former CIS will handle theatrical distribution through its Cosmopol subsidiary and home entertainment through Premiere Multi Media.

From the UK’s Capitol Films, Premiere bought six titles: Cannes out of competition film CQ, Sandra Goldbacher's Me Without You, Robert Altman’s Gosford Park, horror flick Jeepers Creepers, Pumpkin and Matt Dillon’s City Of Ghosts.

Premiere Multimedia this week also renewed its home entertainment distribution agreement with Paramount Pictures for another two years and will begin releasing titles on DVD for the first time in the autumn. Premiere Multi Media also handles home entertainment releasing for Universal Pictures and Dreamworks SKG.

Moscow festival representative Bob van Ronkel has received written expressions of interest from Jack Nicholson and Sean Penn confirming interest in traveling to the Moscow Film Festival in support of The Pledge. "It is enormously gratifying that top-level talent like this is willing to promote our product in Russia," said Chris Abel-Smith, Premiere executive director.

Premiere, which has also secured Peruvian comedy Captain Pantoja And The Special Services from Menemsha Entertainment, this week bolstered its acquisitions team hiring Victoria Kopelovitch as its Los Angeles consultant.

Skouras Films has picked up US rights to two pictures - Pavel Lounguine's The Wedding (La Noce) from Flach Pyramide International and Clara Law's The Goddess Of 1967 from Fortissimo Film Sales.

La Noce, which was produced by Catherine Dussart and played in competition at Cannes last year, is the story of a marriage in contemporary rural Russia. The deal was negotiated by Eric Lagesse, managing director of Flach Pyramide, with Tom Skouras, president of Skouras Films, and Paul Gardner on behalf of Skouras.

The Goddess Of 1967, which played in the Venice Film Festival last year and won the Best Actress prize for Rose Byrne, is the story of a Japanese man who travels to Australia to buy his dream car and falls in with a 17 year-old blind girl. The deal was negotiated by Skouras and Gardner with Wouter Barendrecht and Michael Werner of Fortissimo.

Novem Productions

Shochiku has pre-acquired all Japanese rights to Paris, Je T'Aime, a project by fledgling production company Novem Productions. Paris Je T’Aime is a series of 6-minute short films, each focusing on a different love story set in one of Paris’ 20 districts.

The international film-makers who have already signed on include Woody Allen, Jean-Luc Godard, Tom Tykwer, Asia Argento, Walter Salles and Bertrand Tavernier, as well as actors Guillaume Canet and Fanny Ardant. The collaboration of Emir Kusturica, Sally Potter and Maggie Cheung is still being discussed.

The project, which carries a $3.5m price tag, will be a year in production, from August 2000 to August 2001 The 20 stories will be assembled as a 110 minutes feature for potential theatrical release. TO TOP

Menemsha Entertainment

Menemsha Entertainment has sold Oscar-nominated Czech film Divided We Fall to Daiei in Japan and Cineopen in Korea, continuing a streak on the film which is directed by Jan Hrebejk. Sony Classics is releasing the film domestically in June. Set during World War II in a small Czech town, the film tells the story of a childless couple who hide a Jewish neighbour in their pantry and then become over friendly with local collaborators in an effort to hide their secret. TO TOP

Michael Haneke

Japan’s Nippon Herald has picked up Austrian director Michael Haneke’s The Piano Teacher , his third film to screen in competition at Cannes following Funny Games (1997) and Code Unknown (2000). Starring Isabelle Huppert, Benoit Magimel and Annie Girardor, the study of mutual dependence and hate between a mother and daughter is being handled internationally by MK2. TO TOP

Paradiso

Brussels-based distributor Paradiso has snapped up Benelux rights to The Quiet American, The Plague Season, Assumption Of The Virgin and Iris from Intermedia. From Pandora Cinema it has bought The White Oleander, Company Man, Welcome To Colinwood and A Walk To Remember. From Summit Entertainment it has snagged Brian De Palma’s Femme Fatale and Servicing Sarah. From IAC it bought The Gold Coast and from Distant Horizon it has taken The Dish. From UGC International it bought Netherlands-only rights to Amelie From Montmartre.

Mikado

Italian distributor Mikado has picked up local distribution rights from UGC International to French director Andre Techine’s upcoming title Terminus Des Anges. The film, whose name has been bandied around for a Venice Film Festival slot, is about two poor young women in France who share a flat and struggle to earn a living. Recent pick-ups for Mikado also include two Cannes competition titles: Jacques Rivette’s Va Savoir! and veteran Portuguese director Manoel de Oliveira’s Vou Para Casa. TO TOP

Catch 23 Entertainment

Catch 23 Entertainment, the LA production company funded by Denver-based financier Bob Sturm and run by president Jeremy Barber, is to launch a UK production arm with a £1.5m development fund and an advisory committee composed of ICM (UK) chairman Duncan Heath and European head of international operations Lyndsey Posner.

Barber said he is looking to hire a creative executive to work from ICM's London offices and develop and package three pictures a year originated in the UK with ICM talent. "Duncan and Lyndsey know this world as well as anyone," Barber said. "We are lucky to have their guidance."

No projects have yet been identified, although ICM's UK client list is a who's who of local talent including directors Roger Michell, John Madden, Guy Ritchie, Danny Boyle, Sam Mendes, Michael Winterbottom, Jonathan Glazer and Martin Campbell and actors Rupert Everett, Michael Caine, Anthony Hopkins, Gary Oldman and Rachel Weisz.

Catch 23, which has a US distribution arrangement with Universal Focus, was formed last year by Sturm to produce films in the $3m to $15m range. Among the first titles on the C23 slate are The Professor's Wife, to be directed by Victor Nunez, an adaptation of Melissa Banks' short story collection The Girls Guide To Hunting And Fishing and Mark Romanek's One Hour Photo, starring Robin Williams on which Catch 23 is an equity partner.

Earlier this year, Catch 23 hired talent manager John Carrabino, whose clients include Renee Zellweger and Shannon Doherty, to build a management division, which should have natural synergies with Catch 23's London operation and ICM (UK). TO TOP

Legendary cowboy drama Bonanza is getting the Star Wars treatment as TV bosses announced plans to make a prequel to the series.

Viewers will be saddling up the horses and heading back to the ranch in preparation for the show, to be called Ponderosa. The last episode of Bonanza, a cheesy and rather low budget cowboy serial, was actually made in 1973.

Since then it has achieved cult status among Sunday afternoon television viewers as they lounged their way through countless repeats. Ponderosa will tell the story of the early years of the show's four main characters, Ben Cartwright and his sons, Adam, Hoss and Little Joe.

The Western will feature Ben's early years as a widower raising his three young children on a ranch in Nevada. David Dortort, the original creator of Bonanza, which was one of the first color television programs when it first came to American screens in 1959, will be involved in the program as executive producer.

But viewers can expect a completely new cast and more modern storylines. Few of the original cast are alive. Lorne Greene, who played Ben, died in 1987 and Michael Landon, who played little Joe, died in 1991. Dan Blocker, who played Hoss, died in 1972 of a blood clot, aged just 42, while Victor Sen Yung, who was cook Hop Sing, also passed away.

Pernell Roberts, who played Adam, is the only survivor of the main cast. Meanwhile the original Ponderosa Ranch does survive as a tourist attraction, but is now more likely to be populated by portly American tourists than chaps wearing chaps. Visitors to the Nevada town are also able to enjoy the delights of a Hoss burger, Western wedding and live gunfights.

TV producers hope that the show's enduring appeal of Western frontier spirit and family values will seal Ponderosa's future when it goes to air. TO TOP

World Wide Motion Pictures Corp. -WWMP- Launches East Coast Opening of `'AMY''

Feature Film "AMY'' opens May 18 At The Angelika And Empire 25 In New York Following Acclaimed Runs In Los Angeles And Midwest

LOS ANGELES--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 17, 2001-- AMY, the award-winning Australian film which has won plaudits from audiences around the world, will have its New York premiere May 18 at the Angelika Film Center (www.angelikafilmcenter.com) and the AMC Empire 25 Theatre as announced by Paul Hancock, president and CEO of World Wide Motion Pictures Corp., North American distributor of the Cascade Production.

"We are delighted that AMY will be showcased at these outstanding Manhattan venues,'' Hancock commented. "The Angelika is widely regarded as the nation's leading art theatre, and the AMC Empire 25 is a major new multiplex that has revitalized film going on 42nd Street. To have our film selected for these theatres is indeed an honor.''

AMY (www.amythemovie.com) made its American debut in February in Los Angeles through the major theater chains AMC, Loew's, Mann and Edwards, then began its rollout into the Midwest with a gala premiere at the Celebration Cinema on April 27 in Michigan's state capitol of Lansing, attended by Governor and Mrs. John Engler and other dignitaries.

The winner of 21 international festival awards, including two prizes at Cannes, AMY was hailed by Roger Ebert on his nationally televised show Ebert & Roeper and the Movies as "touching and surprising,'' "thumbs up,'' and Kevin Thomas of the Los Angeles Times, said AMY is "a skilled hearttugger ... engaging and imaginative.''

AMY also received accolades from the Giffoni Film Festival in Italy, Brisbane International Film Festival in Australia, and the Asia Pacific Film Festival in Hong Kong.

AMY is the poignant drama of a young girl traumatized by a tragic loss who can communicate only through music and who ultimately transforms the lives of everyone around her.

Rachel Griffiths, an Oscar nominee for Hilary and Jackie who is currently on screen in the box office hit Blow, stars in AMY under the direction of Nadia Tass. Tass most recently helmed the highly rated television version of The Miracle Worker for Disney and will next bring Mary Karr's best-selling book The Liars' Club to the screen.

WWMP expects more frequent media exposure of its film and television product as it prepares for trading of its common stock securities on NASDAQ SmallCap and other national and regional stock exchanges. WWMP has traded on the OTC Electronic Bulletin Board since 1983.

Founded in 1977, WWMP (www.wwmpc.com) is a diversified company with shareholders throughout the world which is involved in the development, financing, production and distribution of feature films, documentaries, short subjects, industrial films and television productions.

WWMP's industry executives, advisers and board members have produced, distributed and consulted on a wide variety of film and television projects, earning Academy Awards, Emmy Awards and prizes from world film festivals.

Contact: World Wide Motion Pictures Corp., Los Angeles, Linda Goldenberg, 714/960-7264 TO TOP

'Shrek' Animators Add to Reality

No one takes reality for granted after working on the fairy-tale satire "Shrek.'' From fur, to flame, skin and water, the tangible world was rethought and remade for this computer-animated story about a misanthropic ogre and a sass-mouthed donkey who reluctantly rescue a bossy princess.

The film features impossible creatures romping in seemingly photo-real backdrops full of dappling sunlight, swaying leaves and trickling brooks. "The computer was always good with hard things, like plastic toys and bugs, but it hasn't liked soft or translucent things, like animals or plants,'' said Jonathan Gibbs, an animator who developed new programs for "Shrek.''

"Things are better now,'' Gibbs added. "This may be the first digital movie that doesn't have to restrain its story or style because the computers weren't up to it.'' Three years of rendering the film's intricate fantasy world in ones-and-zeros affected how some animators saw reality.

"Sometimes you look up in the sky and say, 'Those clouds would never work. They look too flat, like they were cut out,''' visual effects supervisor Ken Bielenberg said, laughing. "You start to question everything.''

"Shrek'' is being celebrated as a landmark at its animation studio, Pacific Data Images - where "stylized reality'' is the catch phrase spoken by workers in almost every department.

The new movie features some of the most realistic animated humans to hit movie screens so far and became the first animated feature selected in competition at the Cannes Film Festival in 27 years.

"We were just trying to tell a great story that's funny and charming and has a good message, but I'm really proud because I think we've also reached a new level of CG animation,'' said Aron Warner, the company's chief executive officer and a "Shrek'' producer.

With "Shrek,'' Warner said, PDI has shown that digital animation is no longer restricted to tiny background characters in a crowd or the static, sterile surroundings of a toy's playroom or an insect's earthen hovel.

Dressed in the jeans-and-flannel wardrobe of a Silicon Valley executive, he furrowed his brow when asked if there is anything left for computer animators to conquer.

"More holy grails? Sure,'' he said. After a pause, he smiled slightly and added, "But I can't think of anything right now.'' The manipulation of light was the core of many of breakthroughs in "Shrek.''

Rendering feisty Princess Fiona (voiced by Cameron Diaz) would have been impossible without studying dermatology textbooks to determine how various types of illumination play on human skin.

"We wanted her to be very realistic,'' said effects supervisor Bielenberg. "So lighting Fiona was just like lighting Cameron Diaz. You want the sunset to reflect of her face in a way that's flattering. ... Fiona may be a computerized princess, but she has her bad side.''

Shrek, the ill-tempered ogre-hero performed by Mike Myers, has thin, trumpet-shaped ears that occasionally glow from bright background light.

"It's like holding a flashlight under your hand. There's a red glow and you can sort of see some veins,'' Bielenberg said. "It's hard to do, but that's what would happen in the real world.''

Animators also closely monitored the light and tiny shadows between the hundreds of thousands of hairs on the body of Donkey, a jive-talking beast of burden voiced by Eddie Murphy.

"We've all seen animals and we've all seen other people,'' Bielenberg said. "And we didn't want people to see these characters and think, 'Well, something is wrong here.'''

The movie isn't meant to be exactly like real life, Warner cautioned. "We were aiming at a stylized reality,'' he said. "We could have made Fiona look more real, but we felt she would have looked out-of-place with the ogre and talking donkey.''

Pacific Data Images, which has won two Academy Awards for its effects technology in recent years, was founded in 1980. One of its first jobs was producing a title sequence for the syndicated TV show "Entertainment Tonight,'' and the company steadily increased its status through a series of innovative commercials and live-action movie effects.

PDI's biggest Hollywood break came in 1996 after the company joined a partnership with DreamWorks SKG co-founders Jeffrey Katzenberg, Steven Spielberg and David Geffen.

Two years later, the collaboration resulted in the critically acclaimed digital cartoon "Antz,'' in which Woody Allen voiced a neurotic ant named "Z.''

PDI's partnership with DreamWorks has boosted the company's earnings as well as its reputation, with "Antz'' earning more than $120 million in U.S. theaters and video stores.

"Antz'' not only marked PDI's first major venture in the movies, it also sparked a rivalry with another fellow digital pioneer - the Disney-affiliated Pixar Animation, which has been honored 13 times by the Oscars.

Pixar's first "Toy Story'' movie had also set a new standard for animation three years earlier, and PDI saw "Antz'' as a chance to squeeze back into the digital spotlight. DreamWorks hustled the PDI film through production and it debuted several months before Pixar's similarly themed "A Bug's Life.''

"It's a definitely a rivalry, but it's definitely friendly,'' Warner said. "This is a small community, and a lot of people here have friends and loved ones who work in these competing companies. So, it behooves us to be on good terms.''

"Shrek'' marks another PDI-DreamWorks coup, hitting theaters nearly six months before Pixar's upcoming "Monsters, Inc.,'' which also promises new computerized fur and skin technologies.

Luca Prasso, who supervised the body movements of the "Shrek'' characters, said he delighted in taking friends from Pixar to see the movie at a special screening in April.

"You can finally say, 'This is what I've been doing for two years!'' Prasso said. '"This is that thing I couldn't tell you about!'''

While Prasso pulled the strings on characters, Bielenberg and his crew were puppeteering the four elements - earth, air, water and fire.

The company won an Academy Award for its fluid technology in 1998, but the "Shrek'' script called for something new: a scene in which water, beer and mud spill atop characters during a fight.

Mixing different fluids had never been done before, and effects animator Juan Buhler was drafted for some real-world tests.

"We had no idea how to do it, but that's what the story called for,'' he said, while a group of colleagues chuckled. "So these guys dumped a load of mud and water on top of me so we could study how they mixed.''

The tests worked. The new software was devised. Later, they found the water technology was the key to fire and wind.

"We wanted the background in 'Shrek' to be alive and have lots of movement,'' said Scott Peterson, who created the film's earthy greenhouse by digitally "growing'' every blade of grass and every branch and every leaf.

"The difference in trees is usually a matter of gravity,'' he said, punching up the software on his screen. "You add a certain degree to make a birch and add more gravity to bend the branches for a willow.''

An initial experiment with leaf-rustling wind failed, Then they modified an existing program for flowing fluids that made the liquid invisible while moving the leaves softly and smoothly, Bielenberg said.

Meanwhile, Arnauld Lamorlette wanted something outrageous for the film's rescue scene, in which Shrek and Donkey flee a flame-bellowing dragon across a moat of lava.

"So we spent a lot of time playing with fire in the parking lot - burning different things and looking at how the flames moved,'' Lamorlette said. (He joked that there were no human volunteers this time.)

Alas, realistic-looking fire burned beautifully atop animated torches and candles, but seemed unnaturally forced blasting from the dragon like venom. The animator finally used PDI's fluid technology to render a stream of roiling bubbles that he later coated with a skin of flame.

"We had to be able to control the behavior of fire but remain close to reality,'' he said. Then he corrected himself: "I should say, 'stylized reality.''' TO TOP

Some Coming Movies For Which The Pentagon Provided Assistance:

"Black Hawk Down.'' Army shipped eight combat helicopters and about 100 crew to Morocco this spring to film movie based on 1993 raid in which 18 American soldiers died in a failed attempt to capture a Somali warlord. Director Ridley Scott; stars include Josh Hartnett. Filmmakers paying about $3 million for Pentagon assistance. Release expected March 2002.

"Windtalkers.'' Military helped line up 800 off-duty Marines in Hawaii to recreate the invasion of Saipan for film starring Nicolas Cage. Additional 300 service members of Asian descent cast as Japanese. Movie was inspired by the Marines' Navajo code talkers during the Pacific campaign of World War II. U.S. military provided research assistance, helped handle troops, provided filming locations in Hawaii and California. No charge to filmmakers. Director John Woo. Release expected in November.

"The Sum of All Fears.'' Moviemakers paid military $150,000-$200,000 for assistance, including filming of rescue sequence involving three CH-53 helicopters and 50 Marines on location in Canada. Movie is based on a Tom Clancy novel in which terrorists plot to blow up the Super Bowl with a nuclear bomb. Director Phil Alden Robinson; stars Ben Affleck as Jack Ryan. Release expected in 2002.

"We Were Soldiers Once ... and Young.'' Filmmakers have been billed $135,000 so far for military assistance in this Vietnam drama starring Mel Gibson, including filming at bases in Georgia and California, use of helicopters and other equipment as props and actor orientation training. Movie is based on book about first major battle between U.S. and Viet Cong forces. Director Randall Wallace. Release expected December 2001. TO TOP